Industry Groups Wary of Final Cures Act
While the world, and certainly the healthcare world, is focused on testing and treatment for COVID-19, the other topic looming large has been the ONC’s final Cures Act, focused on interoperability and information blocking. Thanks to their public statements, we’ve known for some time how EHR vendors like Epic and Cerner felt about the rule, but now that there’s been some time to digest the final content, industry healthcare groups are weighing in as well.
One of the big provisions in the new rules was that patients would be able to access their healthcare data from a third-party app of their choosing. The main areas of concern that have been raised focus on privacy, data complexity, and administrative burden.
Privacy
America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) voiced their concern regarding patient privacy. By opening up healthcare data to the somewhat loosely defined third-party app of a patient’s choice, healthcare data has an increased chance for exposure, whether it’s unintentional or not.
Aside from the simple fact that adding more data transfers gives more opportunity for data to be intercepted, there is concern that the developers of these third-party apps may not be beholden to regulations like HIPAA. This could also lead to what we’ve seen in areas like consumer genetics testing or basic shopping habits, where data is sold and shared far beyond the reaches of what an individual might expect.
AHIP’s President and CEO, Matt Eyles, stressed the importance of privacy, citing a study that showed 62 percent of consumers saying stronger personal privacy protections outweigh easier access to healthcare data.
Data Complexity
The Medical Group Management Association weighed in on the data that’s contained within an EHR, and how it’s presented to a patient. Either patients are going to need to take a class in coding, or the third-party app developers are going to need to learn to translate the data into a format that’s understandable. They’ll likely need some outside help to get this implemented, but it’s a very important step in getting patients access to their data.
While increased access is certainly a good thing, and patients should be able to see their own data, complex medical data can easily be misinterpreted, so it’s going to become increasingly important to provide context and encourage patients to speak with medical professionals.
Administrative Burden
While the new rule has a two-year phase in period that’s not slated to start for six months, anyone who has led a large IT project knows that this means it is already time for all hands on deck. While large health systems are set up to take on this type of project, smaller organizations may struggle to get together the time and resources to get up to speed. It’s likely that many of these smaller groups are going to have to hire outside help to ensure compliance and there hasn’t been any money set aside to offset this new expenditure.
The AMA is also looking at how fees will be determined when sharing data and is working to ensure new EHR fees coming from this rule won’t burden physicians.
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